I Sent a Poor Man a Dowry, and He Used It to Conquer the World

[Historical romance + comedy + business-savvy heroine + sweet romance + female tycoon x loyal puppy-like general + business + comeback]

Shen Yuan is the richest woman in Jiangnan. With a vast fortune, all she wants is to lie flat and enjoy life.

But before her parents died, they arranged a marriage for her to a low-ranking border guard in the poor, remote Northern Frontier.

Three years into their marriage, the man has yet to come home once. Instead, every so often, he writes to complain about being broke: “Wife, the soldiers are nearly starving. Send two hundred thousand taels at once.”

“Wife, the warhorses are skin and bones. Send another three hundred thousand taels.”

Softhearted, Shen Yuan sends money again and again, thinking she’s supporting a bottomless pit.

Then one day, eight thousand cavalry smash through the gates of the Shen family estate. Their general kneels at the front and cries out,

“We respectfully invite Her Majesty the Empress back to the capital to govern! His Majesty has ascended the throne!”

Shen Yuan is stunned. So all the money she’s sent over the past three years has gone toward funding a rebellion?

Worse still, her husband, whom she has never even met, sends an order: The treasury is empty, so the Empress’s private funds belong to the state.

Shen Yuan sneers. “You think you can get something for nothing? Dream on.”

Whoever pays the officials’ salaries is the one they obey.

From then on, the ministers attend court in the morning and work for the Empress’s businesses in the afternoon.

The emperor demands to know why the officials won’t obey his edicts.

They all cry, “Her Majesty pays better!”